Thinking seasonally, it suddenly seemed to me that the story of the search for a place for Mary to give birth may actually be as significant as the birth, itself. No, don't protest yet: see what you think after I have had a go at explaining. The whole question of acceptability and confidence which comes with knowing who and where you are must be fundamental to human well-being, don't you think? The symbolic possibilities in the situation in which the Holy Family found themselves are endless. As we can't help but notice, there is currently a mind-blowing number of people on this planet without homes. More than just being without, they are exiled and destitute. It must be inconceivable to live any kind of 'ordinary' life in these circumstances. Giving birth on a dinghy will surely have echoes of giving birth in a barn.
From those thoughts evolved thoughts about rejection, of feeling not wanted anywhere by anyone. People who find themselves in the wrong body, those who turn out to be a disappointment to those supposed to love and like them most must constantly feel as if forced in to an out-building on the farm of life. At all levels and in countless predicaments this feeling proves the rocky bed on which survival scrambles to take a hold. I have watched a cat of my acquaintance, who had an unsettled and unreliable early start in life grow from anger, fear and unreachability, even using his host's carpet as a litter tray, in to a joyful, lovable master of all he surveys. He lies unguarded, all the yard (meter) of him, on forbidden surfaces and greets in-comers with a sweet welcome and an invitation to play. I am not sure that humans with similar backgrounds would be able so genuinely and completely to overcome such an unpromising early life. It seems to me that not feeling wanted becomes a sort of fault-line. Thereafter, it is only too easy to regard a perceived rejection as being due to an inadequacy or characteristic in oneself that makes one unwantable. The pivotal thing about Mary, I think, was that she had the support of her husband and a batch of kings and assorted others who turned up in time, it seems, to find her clean and tidy holding a Baby who, according to most depictions of Him, had the look of a baby at least three months old. There is never a sign of blood and gore nor the exhaustion one would have expected after such a difficult and insanitary confinement. Nor does Joseph ever look to me to be someone with the presence of mind and resourcefulness to cut the umbilical cord. Ah well, in such a story anything can be made possible. Veracity is not always preferable to imagination, or, as the saying goes, why spoil a good tale with the truth? Bore da
Monday, 28 December 2015
Friday, 4 December 2015
Received Wisdom
It was a toss up, whether to call this post "Received Wisdom" or "These I Have Learned", or, even, " Wisdom Received". Anyway, the intention is to address myself to all you youngsters out there to help prepare you for 75 on the outside and 40 where it matters. 1) Forget running for that 'bus. Catch the next one. 11) Allow enough time for 'bus-missing. 111) Either throw away your belts or keep your waist beltable. 1V) Do not drop things on to the floor. Your middle hinge will be too rusty to retrieve them. V) Do your best to help maintain standards, eg 'i' before 'e' except after 'c', See above. Do not use 'get' or its relatives. Supply a verb which will do the trick accurately. Do not add words for emphasis, eg very unique. Is it unique or isn't it. Kill off 'importantly' unless it is in a clause with a verb to which it applies. Remember your manners - literally keep bringing them to mind. In your older years you will find yours is the only generation which has any.
V1) Clothes provide a whole catalogue of their own. Here what the Guru calls "Age Appropriate" applies. Throw out the denim. Throw out the narrow-legged trousers - women, and the baseball caps - men. If you must dye your hair pay through the nose so that you, your hairdresser and the junior who washes it are the only ones who know. If you are determined to do it at home, don't. No more bikinis and if you say you still look good in them, I find that very hard to believe. Watch out for swollen ankles - women - so that skirts may not do it for you if you have them: swollen ankles, that is. Watch out for droopy trousers - men. You have shrunk. Have them shortened. 'T' shirts are just about alright, particularly with sleeves at least to the elbow. If they have words on them bin them even if the words say "Keep Calm and ask Mum" or "Dad". No decolltage -women: Don't tell me your neck area is not a touch wrinkled. No chest hair - men. Do up that top button . No more bare arms - women, No ill-fitting false teeth - both. Use nothing which is a) shabby b) not pristine nor sparkling clean. Keep your glasses clean; you will need all the help you can acquire to see where you are going. By the way, I mean spectacles but you should keep your drinking glasses clean, too, (See under 'pristine').
V11) Do not try to flirt. Throw out archness. It is toe-curlingly embarrassing to observe the elderly dealing with A. N. Other as if they were still in their teens or twenties. Indeed, throw out any device which looks good on a young person: it will not be a good look on you post middle-age.Above all, keep learning and do let the young teach their Grandmother to suck eggs. Bore da
V1) Clothes provide a whole catalogue of their own. Here what the Guru calls "Age Appropriate" applies. Throw out the denim. Throw out the narrow-legged trousers - women, and the baseball caps - men. If you must dye your hair pay through the nose so that you, your hairdresser and the junior who washes it are the only ones who know. If you are determined to do it at home, don't. No more bikinis and if you say you still look good in them, I find that very hard to believe. Watch out for swollen ankles - women - so that skirts may not do it for you if you have them: swollen ankles, that is. Watch out for droopy trousers - men. You have shrunk. Have them shortened. 'T' shirts are just about alright, particularly with sleeves at least to the elbow. If they have words on them bin them even if the words say "Keep Calm and ask Mum" or "Dad". No decolltage -women: Don't tell me your neck area is not a touch wrinkled. No chest hair - men. Do up that top button . No more bare arms - women, No ill-fitting false teeth - both. Use nothing which is a) shabby b) not pristine nor sparkling clean. Keep your glasses clean; you will need all the help you can acquire to see where you are going. By the way, I mean spectacles but you should keep your drinking glasses clean, too, (See under 'pristine').
V11) Do not try to flirt. Throw out archness. It is toe-curlingly embarrassing to observe the elderly dealing with A. N. Other as if they were still in their teens or twenties. Indeed, throw out any device which looks good on a young person: it will not be a good look on you post middle-age.Above all, keep learning and do let the young teach their Grandmother to suck eggs. Bore da
Tuesday, 1 December 2015
Back to the Beginning
Other than activities that make life manageable for a baby, like eating, sleeping, crying and, ultimately even walking and talking, she/he starts, as soon as is practicable, to learn other ways to live a life as free from hassle as is possible. For instance, one of the first non-essentials I recall - Mother thought it was essential - was the difference between 'can' and 'may'. All these decades later, I can still hear her voice each time I need one or other. Unfortunately, 'can' applies rather more often than 'may' in spite of the somewhat permissive age in to which I have crept.
Thinking about this, it came to me that old age seems determined to back-track on one's received knowledge, making it necessary to learn and experience all the little ploys again. An apple a day does not keep the Doctor away, particularly if you have dentures and the apple is crisp and juicy. I don't - have dentures, that is. I have green-inked long enough for you to remember that old age renders you invisible so, in an ideal world, there would be a hand, or even one finger to hold on to walking in a crowded street. I have re-learned what happens to fine and wispy hair when it's wet: frizz, not like scotch mist, more like wire wool. (Does wire wool still exist, do you know?) This covering was quite attractive when thin and wispy also meant a bow tied in the scrabbled together on the on-their-way locks. It was a step in the ultimate direction of a head full of woman's glory. Now it's a mess. Post prandial napping seems as natural as it must have been at six months, the difference being that it is rather late in the age to be wasting any time at all. I find, too, that I would have difficulty even in picking up as much as a Teddy Bear since my middle hinges have gone. I am also 'D' shaped in the middle, as little ones are, too, so that doesn't help deal with that stuff that's on the floor. I need a me from a former time when I was picker-up in Chief, to do my picking up, now. I recall the excitement of a whole page of script leaping out of the page as a readable reality. I was five, or maybe six and it was "Janet and John", (the book's title, of course). I have the same excitement when I press a key on my computer and find the whole page has actually not been consigned to cyberspace. But one enormous gain wrested from the rules of baby-/childhood: I am so old I no longer have to eat my greens. Prynhawn da
Thinking about this, it came to me that old age seems determined to back-track on one's received knowledge, making it necessary to learn and experience all the little ploys again. An apple a day does not keep the Doctor away, particularly if you have dentures and the apple is crisp and juicy. I don't - have dentures, that is. I have green-inked long enough for you to remember that old age renders you invisible so, in an ideal world, there would be a hand, or even one finger to hold on to walking in a crowded street. I have re-learned what happens to fine and wispy hair when it's wet: frizz, not like scotch mist, more like wire wool. (Does wire wool still exist, do you know?) This covering was quite attractive when thin and wispy also meant a bow tied in the scrabbled together on the on-their-way locks. It was a step in the ultimate direction of a head full of woman's glory. Now it's a mess. Post prandial napping seems as natural as it must have been at six months, the difference being that it is rather late in the age to be wasting any time at all. I find, too, that I would have difficulty even in picking up as much as a Teddy Bear since my middle hinges have gone. I am also 'D' shaped in the middle, as little ones are, too, so that doesn't help deal with that stuff that's on the floor. I need a me from a former time when I was picker-up in Chief, to do my picking up, now. I recall the excitement of a whole page of script leaping out of the page as a readable reality. I was five, or maybe six and it was "Janet and John", (the book's title, of course). I have the same excitement when I press a key on my computer and find the whole page has actually not been consigned to cyberspace. But one enormous gain wrested from the rules of baby-/childhood: I am so old I no longer have to eat my greens. Prynhawn da
Sunday, 15 November 2015
What's More
The "Does He Take Sugar?" phenomenon I put to you in the last post actually has several other faces. One that features most often in my life could be called "Ignorant, Naughty Schoolgirl". This occurs when I am seen to have made a mistake, indeed, often have made a mistake. The perpetrator then fixes me with a look which conveys both disgust and impatience - or even patience - and manages to correct me while making me feel a hopeless, inconsiderate waste of space: a naughty Schoolgirl' sensation; all this in a voice of compassionate understanding which feels infantilising in itself
I know, I know: I must take responsibility for my own reactions and I do, but I still don't like the way it makes me feel. One of the concomitant fall-outs is that I lose the capacity to justify myself or point out that I am factually right on the occasions when I am. Perhaps this highlights another potential hazard of older age: confidence, while increased in terms of sticking to a difficult truth, diminishes in terms of perceived tests of friendship and relatedness. In fact, the whole 'naughty schoolgirl' thing tends to depend on ones own particular fault line. Mine seems to be a concern that I may be seen as not-wantable. Yours may be, for instance, that you think only of yourself, or that the world owes you whatever. At the forty end of my spectrum there was time to 'cure' the fault that was irritating the other: time for another chance. Now, at this ancient end, the twig may fall off the tree before there has been any opportunity for reparation. How to reconcile that with the elderly tendency to be direct and imperious is a conundrum I find disheartening and insoluble. Quite often my dodgy steps are to do with an unfamiliarity with the electronic world. I have been to extraordinary lengths to track down over days information or an object. The Guru taps out a few digits on his phone and has the answer in seconds. To be fair, he doesn't subject me to 'the look' when I do something stupid and/or old-fashioned. I did risk buying cat food on the Internet - does it take a capital 'i'? - and was landed with a bag so big there is no cupboard to take it and I doubt my three and a half-year-old cat will have life enough to eat it all even if I have life enough to serve it.
Someone who was staying with me once accused the cat of being evil and opportunistic. (I think he had used a hand-basin as a facility). "He's a cat" I protested. Me, I'm an old lady, evil and opportunistic as well I might. Prynhawn da
I know, I know: I must take responsibility for my own reactions and I do, but I still don't like the way it makes me feel. One of the concomitant fall-outs is that I lose the capacity to justify myself or point out that I am factually right on the occasions when I am. Perhaps this highlights another potential hazard of older age: confidence, while increased in terms of sticking to a difficult truth, diminishes in terms of perceived tests of friendship and relatedness. In fact, the whole 'naughty schoolgirl' thing tends to depend on ones own particular fault line. Mine seems to be a concern that I may be seen as not-wantable. Yours may be, for instance, that you think only of yourself, or that the world owes you whatever. At the forty end of my spectrum there was time to 'cure' the fault that was irritating the other: time for another chance. Now, at this ancient end, the twig may fall off the tree before there has been any opportunity for reparation. How to reconcile that with the elderly tendency to be direct and imperious is a conundrum I find disheartening and insoluble. Quite often my dodgy steps are to do with an unfamiliarity with the electronic world. I have been to extraordinary lengths to track down over days information or an object. The Guru taps out a few digits on his phone and has the answer in seconds. To be fair, he doesn't subject me to 'the look' when I do something stupid and/or old-fashioned. I did risk buying cat food on the Internet - does it take a capital 'i'? - and was landed with a bag so big there is no cupboard to take it and I doubt my three and a half-year-old cat will have life enough to eat it all even if I have life enough to serve it.
Someone who was staying with me once accused the cat of being evil and opportunistic. (I think he had used a hand-basin as a facility). "He's a cat" I protested. Me, I'm an old lady, evil and opportunistic as well I might. Prynhawn da
Wednesday, 4 November 2015
Spare Parts
Centuries - well, decades - ago a lady helped in my family's business. She liked to be really busy and whenever she found herself idle would say "Oh dear, I feel like a spare part." Recently I had an experience which came under the same heading but with a different content. Planning a brief break with A.N. Other, the suggestion was made that I should acquire a suitcase whose dimensions fitted the 'hand luggage' requirements of the relevant airline so that we would not waste too much of our mini-break waiting for luggage from the hold.
We duly went together to a specialist luggage shop. The Other explained what we wanted to the assistant who approached us. Without hesitation he addressed himself to the Other in terms of " What do you think will suit her best? How much is she prepared to spend?" and other queries destined to clarify what would be the right purchase for the senile, deaf, dumb and non-English speaker hovering over him. His concerns were answered and a case produced that cost a month's mortgage installment. Accepting the parsimony of the Other he produced some more reasonably priced. Without once looking at me he showed his compassion, saying "This one is light enough for her. I recommend one with four wheels. She can ask for help to lift it in to the locker" and so forth and so fifth. With some difficulty we managed not to catch one another's eye and so avoided the discourtesy of laughing in his face. Finally, a case was chosen, at which point I asked him what his best price for it would be. Imagine his astonishment. Not only was I alive and well and in his shop but I had the gall to bargain with him. £6 was knocked off the asking price and we and the case rolled out of the shop free to laugh at last. That was fun. It is not so funny when I am an invisible spare part to people rushing past me not giving a d..n that I wobble and could easily fall over. It seems elderly women inevitably move from eyelash fluttering through stick waving to invisibilty. I have green-inked about this before. Which brings me to another observation you may find relevant: the elderly, forgetting to whom they have told what, inevitably repeat themselves. Blog-browsing backwards I see that I am as guilty of that as the next dotty old age pensioner. Be patient with me, I beg you. However, I have to say there is merit in some spare parts: implanted contact lenses, hearing aids, anti-pain patches and a third leg. No Zimmer frame as yet Bore da
We duly went together to a specialist luggage shop. The Other explained what we wanted to the assistant who approached us. Without hesitation he addressed himself to the Other in terms of " What do you think will suit her best? How much is she prepared to spend?" and other queries destined to clarify what would be the right purchase for the senile, deaf, dumb and non-English speaker hovering over him. His concerns were answered and a case produced that cost a month's mortgage installment. Accepting the parsimony of the Other he produced some more reasonably priced. Without once looking at me he showed his compassion, saying "This one is light enough for her. I recommend one with four wheels. She can ask for help to lift it in to the locker" and so forth and so fifth. With some difficulty we managed not to catch one another's eye and so avoided the discourtesy of laughing in his face. Finally, a case was chosen, at which point I asked him what his best price for it would be. Imagine his astonishment. Not only was I alive and well and in his shop but I had the gall to bargain with him. £6 was knocked off the asking price and we and the case rolled out of the shop free to laugh at last. That was fun. It is not so funny when I am an invisible spare part to people rushing past me not giving a d..n that I wobble and could easily fall over. It seems elderly women inevitably move from eyelash fluttering through stick waving to invisibilty. I have green-inked about this before. Which brings me to another observation you may find relevant: the elderly, forgetting to whom they have told what, inevitably repeat themselves. Blog-browsing backwards I see that I am as guilty of that as the next dotty old age pensioner. Be patient with me, I beg you. However, I have to say there is merit in some spare parts: implanted contact lenses, hearing aids, anti-pain patches and a third leg. No Zimmer frame as yet Bore da
Friday, 23 October 2015
Forward Planning
The other day I received a telephone call from the Box Office of a concert venue I frequent frequently. It seems I hadn't sent back an application form for tickets for the season January to March 2016. I am what is called a Patron Member so warrant such a call. When I asked myself why I hadn't done so, my inner voice explained that it didn't tempt fate by forward booking. This is a fairly new experience and takes some getting used to. After all, "see you next week" was just as much a reality as breakfast in days gone by. I found myself calculating the cost of the tickets I then ordered and wondering whether or not it was a worthwhile investment in a future I may not have. It was.
I listen to the news with a different ear. It seems unlikely I will either benefit or lose from projected government intervention in whatever 'in the next five years'. Dragging myself in to the technical C21st is begining to feel less important. May be I could scrape through with one foot in and the other behind for the number of years I may have left. Tidying cupboards is another manifestation. It seems my inner world wants to rid itself of the unecessary, the not- needed. It is actually true of worries, concerns and irritations, they are taking the external form of busy-housewifeness. There is an extra bonus of having 'as if' new clothes, wearing items I had forgotten about in an over-crowded watdrobe, (closet, across the Pond). This busy-ness may also make it easier for the young who will have to sort me out in absentia when the time comes. In a half-jesting way, I find I have started to respond "if I'm spared" when someone proposes an assignation a bit further on in the diary. It occured to me that I now don't have time to revisit all the friends I have made in the books I have read and re-read. Like many women of my generation, I was in love with Lord Peter Wimsey, the 'hero' of Dorothy Sayers detective stiories. I have them all but if I re-read all of them will there be time for "For Whom the Bell Tolls"? Working at the Out Patient enquiry desk at the local hospital I stepped outside the prescribed short answer to help a patient actually down to the clinic he needed. On the way passed, after his appointment, he stopped at my desk and said he had been told not to start "War and Peace". He was gone before I could comment. Anyway, what could I have said? It reminded me that I was talking about funerals at a gathering of friends at the end of a concert given by a close musician friend. I was saying that my wishes for my funeral included mostly recordings of him He heard this and asked why I didn't want him there, live, at once adding "we'd better talk dates, though. I'm getting very busy". Bore da
I listen to the news with a different ear. It seems unlikely I will either benefit or lose from projected government intervention in whatever 'in the next five years'. Dragging myself in to the technical C21st is begining to feel less important. May be I could scrape through with one foot in and the other behind for the number of years I may have left. Tidying cupboards is another manifestation. It seems my inner world wants to rid itself of the unecessary, the not- needed. It is actually true of worries, concerns and irritations, they are taking the external form of busy-housewifeness. There is an extra bonus of having 'as if' new clothes, wearing items I had forgotten about in an over-crowded watdrobe, (closet, across the Pond). This busy-ness may also make it easier for the young who will have to sort me out in absentia when the time comes. In a half-jesting way, I find I have started to respond "if I'm spared" when someone proposes an assignation a bit further on in the diary. It occured to me that I now don't have time to revisit all the friends I have made in the books I have read and re-read. Like many women of my generation, I was in love with Lord Peter Wimsey, the 'hero' of Dorothy Sayers detective stiories. I have them all but if I re-read all of them will there be time for "For Whom the Bell Tolls"? Working at the Out Patient enquiry desk at the local hospital I stepped outside the prescribed short answer to help a patient actually down to the clinic he needed. On the way passed, after his appointment, he stopped at my desk and said he had been told not to start "War and Peace". He was gone before I could comment. Anyway, what could I have said? It reminded me that I was talking about funerals at a gathering of friends at the end of a concert given by a close musician friend. I was saying that my wishes for my funeral included mostly recordings of him He heard this and asked why I didn't want him there, live, at once adding "we'd better talk dates, though. I'm getting very busy". Bore da
Tuesday, 13 October 2015
Luddism
Now that title may well turn out to be a word I have invented. The condition I certainly have not and I am struggling between regret that I am still living in the last century and delight that one of us, at least, is keeping up with old traditions. It is risible that an old lady has to make as much effort to 'learn' the C21st as a reluctant student of, say, Mandarin. I still write thank-you letters. One of my friends, contemporary minus nine years, said, without rancour, that an email was more immediate. Ah, yes, but you can't stand it on the mantlepiece or file it under 'miscellaneous' in your overwought filing system. What about love letters? Do they just turn up on Facebook and Twitter? Not that I have access to either. The Guru thought it was appropriate Luddism to bar me from those two modern communication systems. But what to do with the pink ribbon in which they should be tied? Leave it for the cat to play with, I suppose. Surely conveyance of condolence has to be by letter. One would imagine that the bereaved are a long way from bothering to open their electronic mail at such a heart- rending moment. On the other hand, a round robin of text messages conveyed the news of a recent demise - not, I hasten to say - originated by the family but a hodge podge of friends and colleagues.
Someone close to me has emailed a request for some printing, the material having been sent in an attachment. The Guru assumes it is a pose. That I pretend not to know how to deal with attachments so that laziness may prevail under the guise of ignorance. I do suspect there is an element of unconscious manipulation in my attitude but if you had asked me to print off some attached music for you, you'd be very suspicious if you received only half the score. Fortunately, I remember how to read music so I am fairly confident I got it all. My whole email system has been terrorising me. It keeps telling me my session has ended. No, it hasn't and why is it making those strictures now when it has been co-operating well enough for the last umpteen years. I watched a TV advertisement last evening which promised I could turn my heating on and off on an Underground train by phone. My washing machine could be commanded thus, too. Oh dear: I can just about use my mobile phone as a landline to call and receive calls. I have been known to send the occasional text, not always to the intended recipient but appearing under 'sent messages' in due course. Another person close to me won't even attempt to text but will read the ones received and then telephone if a response is required. I lack C21st mores. I don't use my mobile phone at dinner, or anytime, with friemds. Much out-of-home food is beyond me since I can't eat chillie. (Can I even spell it?) I am stuck when I am addressed on the 'phone by my first name and have taken to announcing myself as Mrs. Mountford to obviate the possibility. This is not a snobbish or pedantic reaction but an emotional one: my inner world is jolted by the use of my first name by a total stranger. First names, for me, are like 'thou' in the languages that use the second person singular. Still, when all is said and done, a rose by any other name....Prynhawn da P.S. Is there a C21st way to keep the cat off the table?
Someone close to me has emailed a request for some printing, the material having been sent in an attachment. The Guru assumes it is a pose. That I pretend not to know how to deal with attachments so that laziness may prevail under the guise of ignorance. I do suspect there is an element of unconscious manipulation in my attitude but if you had asked me to print off some attached music for you, you'd be very suspicious if you received only half the score. Fortunately, I remember how to read music so I am fairly confident I got it all. My whole email system has been terrorising me. It keeps telling me my session has ended. No, it hasn't and why is it making those strictures now when it has been co-operating well enough for the last umpteen years. I watched a TV advertisement last evening which promised I could turn my heating on and off on an Underground train by phone. My washing machine could be commanded thus, too. Oh dear: I can just about use my mobile phone as a landline to call and receive calls. I have been known to send the occasional text, not always to the intended recipient but appearing under 'sent messages' in due course. Another person close to me won't even attempt to text but will read the ones received and then telephone if a response is required. I lack C21st mores. I don't use my mobile phone at dinner, or anytime, with friemds. Much out-of-home food is beyond me since I can't eat chillie. (Can I even spell it?) I am stuck when I am addressed on the 'phone by my first name and have taken to announcing myself as Mrs. Mountford to obviate the possibility. This is not a snobbish or pedantic reaction but an emotional one: my inner world is jolted by the use of my first name by a total stranger. First names, for me, are like 'thou' in the languages that use the second person singular. Still, when all is said and done, a rose by any other name....Prynhawn da P.S. Is there a C21st way to keep the cat off the table?
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